Marietta Allison, 61, of Austin, was shot and killed in Houston on the evening of March 6, 2026, while visiting a friend who was receiving chemotherapy. After dropping her friend, Cassie Daniel, at an apartment in the Heights, Allison went to park and was confronted in the 500 block of W. 20th Street by a man attempting to steal her purse. A struggle followed and Allison was shot in the neck. Daniel reported hearing a scream and a gunshot shortly after Allison left to park the car. Allison was taken to a local hospital where she later died.

The assailant was identified as 18-year-old Darius Hall. He fled in Allison’s vehicle; police located the car about an hour later, which led to a pursuit that ended when the car crashed near the Southwest Freeway and Buffalo Speedway. Hall ran and barricaded himself in a nearby townhome complex, prompting an hours-long standoff before SWAT officers took him into custody. He has been charged at the state level with capital murder, evading arrest, and tampering with evidence, and federal authorities have filed carjacking and firearms charges.

Allison’s family and friends remember her as a kind, selfless woman devoted to helping her friend through cancer. Does anyone in the Heights that evening have information about the confrontation or the vehicle’s movements before the crash?